I'm still alive. Holy shit. I know, I'm just as shocked as you are. It's hard to believe, but it's a year later and I've gone from this to this (in case you're new to thefark.com, see this story to understand the reference):

Whereas last year I had to worry about finding foods I could eat through a tube, the only thing I have to worry about now is brushing my shoulders off. "But Fark," you may ask, "it looks like those you and those girls may have been slightly inebriated at the time of this photograph. Are you sure that had nothing to do with it?" Yes. I am. I don't know what you're talking about, but those photographs were taken completely sober. "But, what about those girls wearing the hats that say 'drunk' on them?" Uhhhh.... shut up.

I'll see if I can post more updates later. So keep checking this site. Every day.

Exactly one month ago today, this is what I looked like. I was so tired I could barely move, my mouth was ruberbanded shut, and everything I ate got sucked out of my stomach through a tube as soon as I swallowed it. I didn't think I'd ever be able to eat solid food again. It's amazing how much can change in a month. Almost all my swelling is gone, I can open my mouth pretty wide, I don't get tired as easily anymore... but the best part: I can eat normal-people foods. This last week the doctor took off the last bands I had on and said I could chew "soft foods". He said he recommended I only eat pasta or fish for a while, but he left in three little words that made all the difference - at my discretion. In other words I could basically eat whatever I wanted as long as my jaw didn't fall off. So this past week I've been able to eat pizza, hamburgers, huge burritos, fajitas, and more. It's awesome being able to chew again, but it feels kinda wierd with the new bite. I'm startin to get used to it though.

Now yesterday, something completely awesome happened. I was out shopping for college stuff, and I was able to get a 20" flat screen TV for only $99. Ok, so I know what you're thinking: "Damn, who'd you have to blow to get that deal?". The real question is, who didn't I have to blow. Just kidding. Pervert. I can't believe you actually think I would do something like that just to get a $30 discount on a TV. I'd only do it if they gave me the TV free, ok? Good, now that we have that cleared up, I'll tell you how I scored that deal without having to perform any gay sex acts. So I walk into the store, and I ask if they've got any more of those 20" TV's they're selling for $139 left in stock. Unfortunately, they don't. So we go to another best buy. They don't have 'em either. But they do have these 2 TV's, same model that they're selling for $99 because they got cracked during shipping. But c'mon, who wants a cracked TV, so I asked if the floor model was for sale. At first the guy said no, but then his friend came up and started looking at me all wierd. Then he was like "holy shit, that's the guy from thefark.com! Damn dude, your web site is the best thing to come along since 2-ply toilet paper! Let's switch out this cracked model with the floor model and just give him the floor model for $99." Okay, so the part about him noticing me from thefark.com isn't exactly "true", but that would be tight if it had happened. He really did exchange the cracked model for the floor model which was in perfect condition though, so that was pretty damn sweet.

TheFark.com Theory #1: Where did Mary Jane come from?

Alright, so if you read the title you probably noticed that you get a bonus feature in today's little posting. That's right, my theory on marijuana. Was it vicoden-induced? Probably. But here it is:

So one day I just started thinking, why is marijuana illegal if something like alcohol is legal? After all, God didn't make alcohol, but he did make marijuana. Or did he? See, then I started thinkin that maybe marijuana was around in the Garden of Eden. Think about it, it would explain a LOT. So Eve's just sittin there chillin', being naked, livin the good life, when she decides "hey, look at this plant.. It's not like those other plants over there. I'm gonna try smokin this shit!" And she does, when all of a sudden she sees this snake that starts talkin to her, and she gets the munchies and that apple tree starts lookin reeeal good. I mean come on, how's she gonna see this snake that starts talkin to her if she's not on somethin. It coulda been shrooms too I guess, I'm not sure. So then she passes it over to adam, he takes a toke, and he's like damn, I'm kinda hungry too so then he tries it. And of course, like the bible says the whole thing happened cuz the snake told her to do it. But would she have seen the snake if she wasn't smokin the reefer? Maybe that's why one of the names for it is the devil's weed.

So there ya go, my theory, it could end up being an earth-shattering revalation about why we're not all naked and living in paradise anymore. Or it could just be completely wrong. Which one is more likely? I'm gonna say the latter, but hey, ya never know.

Well, am I yet? According to my orthodontist, maybe. I paid him a visit today to give him a look at the new jaw, and he told me it was "an excellent result". As you can tell, he was thoroughly excited. Even though he didn't really seem that enthusiastic to the untrained eye, personally I think what he said is orthodontist-ese for "you are one of the sexiest men I have ever seen and if you were a girl I'd totally wanna hit that". Of course, I could be wrong, but that's not likely.

So yeah, basically everything's comin along pretty damn well, so that's pretty cool. Since I wrote something last I've been doin a ton of stuff- hangin out with friends before they leave for college, watched American Wedding which is a damn funny movie that everyone should go see, had to clean my entire room and the garage, which sucked. A lot. Since I hadn't cleaned my room in like 3 years. Now everything's supposedly "organized" but I have no idea where any of my stuff is, at least before I knew exactly where it was in the pile on my floor. Now I have to remember exactly how we organized it and dig through my closet to find the box, it's ridiculous. I hate cleaning.

Anyway, I also went to Monterey, and saw the aquarium, which reminded me of an idea I had a while ago. For if I ever get rich and have lots of money to spend on stuff I don't need. Basically, what I wanna do is have a swimming pool and just dump a sea otter in there. Why? Because that would be freakin awesome. I mean people would come over and be like "look, that guy's got an otter in his pool, that's the most awesome thing I've ever seen". And who doesn't like sea otters? Everybody loves em, especially when they're in your swimming pool. Now just in case there's any confusion, I'm not talking about those lazy stanky-ass sea lions you see on pier 39. They're cool to watch sometimes when they fight and stuff, but they smell like crap and a lot of the time just lay there, plus they'd wake you up every morning with that noise they make that i can't find any way to type out. Anyway, if I can't put a sea otter in a pool, my backup plan is to put it in the hot tub. That might actually even be more cool, since it's a smaller space, so you'd be like sitting down and the sea otter would be all swimming around you and stuff. That would be tight. And this is why I love vicoden. How else could I think of this stuff?

Wooooooohooooo!!!!!!! I think today is probably one of the best days of my life. My mouth is no longer rubberbanded shut, and I can actually open my jaw... kinda. The muscles are all tight so i can only open it part way (see this pic), and it's a little sore opening it, but still... it OPENS! Now I just have to wear these 2 rubberbands on the sides, but I get to take them off 3x a day for an hour to eat/brush teeth/do jaw exercises and I can even open my mouth with these bands on. But that isn't why today is so great. I actually got to eat food through a spoon! I can almost hear your reaction now: "well whooptie freakin doo, you get to eat through a spoon, BFD..." You're damn right BFD. You try eating everything through a syringe for a week and tell me you don't think it's a big deal. Now on my birthday, shortly before surgery, we went to a really good mexican restaurant in Tijuana. And one of the things that came with the dinner was beans, and they tasted damn good at the time. Well today, we got some beans from Taco Bell. And let me tell you, the beans from taco bell tasted about 50 times better. I'm pretty sure it just tastes so good cuz it wasn't liquified like everything else i've been eating for the past week but still...

The swelling's also going down, I'm starting to look like an actual person. I kinda don't feel like shaving tho cuz of all the numb spots on my face... thankfully i can get away with that cuz my hair doesn't grow that fast and its blond. Otherwise I'd end up looking like Tom Hanks in castaway pretty soon. I'm sure I'm still a couple weeks away from being, as my orthodontist likes to call it, "handsome to the rest of the world" but I'm definitely heading in the right direction.

I'm feelin a lot better overall too. I've got a lot more energy and I'm actually gettin out of the house. Yesterday I went to see SWAT. You know what I don't like about going out places tho, is seeing everybody else eating food. Like in the movie, everybody's eating popcorn or hot dogs, and you can smell it, and ya have this faint memory of at one time being able to eat some of the stuff. At one point, I thought of grabbing the popcorn from the person next to me, and running out to try to find a blender to put it in. But thankfully I didn't do that cuz I'm pretty sure I couldn't outrun anybody right now.

Oh, FUNNY STORY: My mom called after the doctor's appointment to find out how it went... and i told her "well, mom, the doctor said the jaw plate had shifted, and they're going to have to do emergency reconstructive surgery sometime this week." Keep in mind that my mom is on the east coast now and I'm staying with an old family friend for the week, and she was really worried about leaving me home after surgery. So she totally freaked out, and was like "oh my god! oh my god! when is it?". Then just as she was about to volunteer to fly back on a plane, I said "HAHAHAHA Just kidding!!!". So yeah, basically I almost gave my mom a heart attack. I feel kinda bad. But at least it was pretty funny.

Well, I got released from the hospital today. And seriously, if you've ever seen the TV show Primetime Glick, I look exactly like that guy. Look at these pics! I've got the most ginormously huge face I have ever seen. The first couple days in the hospital were pretty tough - it's damn hard to eat with tubes sticking through both your nostrils and down into your throat, and I couldn't sleep at all the first night either. They also had some pump in my stomach on the first night, so everything I ate got automatically sucked into a bag - I guess they didn't want anything to get into my stomach so it didn't react badly with the anesthia. Overall the pain wasn't too bad, it was just kinda a dull, continuous sorta pain around my jaw area. But the drugs helped a lot with that. I didn't puke at all, so I was really happy about that.

The turning point came on the second day when they took the tubes out of my nose. That just made things a whole lot better for me. I actually got up and walked around the hospital a little with my dad, and scared all the "normal" people walking around in the halls. It was pretty funny just to go out and watch people stare at my freakish looking face while trying to pretend they didn't see it. Good times.

Anyway, I instructed my mom to take a bunch of pictures while I was in the hospital and she obviously did a good job at that. Check out the pics page if you haven't already. So yea, my jaw is rubber-banded shut right now so I can't really talk, so I'm pretty much stuck either talking to people on IM or watching tv. I'm thinkin about going down to blockbuster and getting some movies too. I wanna walk up to some random kid in line and just stare at him and scare the crap out of him. That's the cool part about this surgery - I'm just so freakishly disfigured I can make random people shit themselves.

Feeding myself is an interesting process. My jaw is rubberbanded shut, so I pretty much have to eat everything through a syringe. So basically, I'll be living off ensure shakes and soup broth for the next week or 2. I think they take the bands off after 2 weeks, so that'll be pretty cool. Anyway, I'm gonna go get some sleep now, the rest of the site is pretty much up so check it out. Sign the guestbook, too.

Holy shit. It's about 11:55 PM on August 3, and I'm goin in for surgery in about 8 1/2 hours. But, since I have to be there 2 hours before the surgery, that means I have to wake up at 5:45 AM. Now if that "A" in "AM" were a "P", that wouldn't be so much of a problem. But it's not a P. It's an A. 5:45 AM. That is so freakin early... my mind doesn't even work when I have to get up that early. I would write a story about some other time when I had to get up that early, but I'm too tired to even do that now. If you want a story, read the one about the kid that went in for jaw surgery choking on his own vomit. That'll be in the newspaper in a couple of days. Why?

Well, you see, I kind of "bent" some of the doctor's recommendations for the "pre-surgery" period. For example, it said you should not drink alcohol for at least 2 weeks prior to the surgery. And well, my birthday was 3 days ago, and we went to Tijuana... which was awesome, by the way. But I mean, how can you go to Tijuana and not have a margarita and a shot of tequilla? or two? or three? or... well yea, I kinda lost count. Whoops. Anyway, I figure that doesn't really count against the recommendation because we were in another country, so it must be okay. Also, they said that I absolutely could not have anything to eat or drink (even water) after midnight before the surgery... and I just finished eating at 11:57. But how do we know if my clock is set to the same time as the surgery clock? What if the doctor says, "You know what, just to mix things up a little, let's start this surgery exactly 3 minutes early today. After all, nobody would be stupid enough to eat 3 minutes before the deadline. Or go to Tijuana and drink alcohol only a few days before going into surgery." Ha! Guess I showed him... When I'm puking all over the place, we'll see who's laughing then. Probably won't be me. Cuz I'm guessing it would be pretty hard to puke and laugh at the same time. But can it be done? Only time will tell.

"What's up, my niggas?" My dad suggested that I go to East San Jose, walk up to the first group of black men I see, and shout this phrase as loud as I possibly could. How is this related to surgery, you ask? Well, let me explain: I'm white. I'm probably about as honkey as you can get. I don't tan. At all. I alternate between shades of white, red, and peeling. I mean, I wish I was black - then I'd be able to do all kinds of things I can't do now. I would be able to dance, I'd be better in sports, I could use cool pickup lines without sounding like a complete jackass -- for example, this summer when my friend Brian was looking for pickup lines, II came up with this one (among others): "Damn girl, you got the ba-donk-a-donk butt... What you say we get behind that shack there and make me some babies?" If I say that now, it's funny, but I still look like an idiot. But if I were black, I'd say that shit and it'd come off smoooooth like a baby's ass. Not that I check out baby's asses or anything, but you get my point. The best part about being black though, I have to say, would be the ability to go out in the sun without SPF 2-billion and still not get my skin fried off.

Anyway, what the hell was I talking about? Oh yeah, back to how it's related to surgery: so me being the white boy that I am, my dad thought I could just go to East SJ, shout that out, and get my jaw broken for free. We'd save tons of money on the surgery bills, some of which could possibly go toward the gallons of instant-tan lotion that I so desperately need.

So yeah, the site's up, and I'll try to update it as I'm recovering from surgery. Wish me luck. Or better yet, drop me a line.